Tuesday, May 30, 2017

Happy Bee-Day Shaker Card

Today's card was made keeping the challenge from Power Poppy to "Frame It Up!"  in mind...so I made a hexagon frame and then turned it into a shaker card!



I used two stamp sets for this A5 (5 x 7) side folding white card...the "Bee Happy" set is from Amuse Studio and the "Thanks Much" is a very versatile  ATS set that you can get for FREE from Fun Stamper's Journey when you place a $50 order by the end of June.


Using Black Licorice ink from FSJ, I repeatedly stamped the "hand-made honey" hexagon so that it covered the entire card front. I then over stamped some of them with the background stamp in Raw Sienna Palette ink. 


Using 2 different blades and my Creative Memories hexagon cutting system, I cut a frame from mustard colored cardstock for the shaker card window. I stamped the large bee 3 times on scrap paper, colored them with Spectrum Noir pens, topped it off with some clear Wink of Stella glimmer and then fussy cut them out. 


I adhered the acetate to the hexagon frame with ScraPerfect's  Best Glue Ever and cut the foam tape in half length-wise to build the frame up to hold all the goodies inside...sequins, micro beads, and "confetti".


Using the BGE, I adhered the 3 bees to the front edges of the frame, bending their wings up a bit for added dimension and using mini foam dots, I adhered the sentiment that I embossed on black cardstock and cut out. 


 Using a paper punch from Creative Memories, I cut out 3 black hexagons and stamped them with the mini honeycomb in FSJ's Whip Cream ink. After heat setting them, I cut them in half and glued 3 pieces to the front of the card and 3 to the inside. Using images from "Bee Happy", I decorated the inside of the card and now it is ready to send to one of my sister-in-laws for her birthday in July.


Until next time~



Sunday, May 28, 2017

Quick and Easy Masculine Birthday Card How To

Hello -Kathy here from Create.365 for ScraPerfect today with a quick and easy card for any man in your life. I made this one for my "little brother" who is turning 40 this year. Using the May sketch from Stick It Down, I added diecuts so I could enter it @ The Male Room too.





To make this card, I gathered circle punches in 2 sizes, a retired classic car stamp set from TAC, a limited edition stamp set from FSJ, a retired sentiments set from CTMH, my HS Edge Distresser, white cardstock, patterned paper and vellum. The finished card measures 8.5" x 3.5" and I'll just mail it in a legal size envelope. 


Using the largest circle punch to cut out the patterned paper and the smaller one to cut out the vellum, I then ran the edge distresser along the edges of both to roughen them up and give them some subtle dimension. I used the Memento London Fog ink to repeatedly stamp the classic car for the card front until it was as dark as I wanted it to be. And I used the blue and green chalk inks for the "ink splat" stamp I used for the background of the card front.


Using my Prismacolor watercolor pencils and a Dove blender I colored the car using only 2 pencil colors and then fussy cut it out.


I die cut the "happy birthday" from dark gray metallic paper and used ScraPerfect's Best Glue Ever to adhere the 2 circles and the sentiment to the the card front...a little bit goes a long way and the No-Clog Writing Cap with the fine tip makes it super easy to control.


The fussy cut out car I added on top of the vellum with foam pop dots to pop it up...here you can really see the effect I got by using the edge distresser -especially on the patterned paper.


I gotta say, I really do like the way this card turned out!


On the inside, I stamped the CTMH sentiments and stamped the other car from that set with a second generation inking (all I did was stamp it off one time on scratch paper first) to get the lighter toned effect. And that's all there is to this card...so you can see that it really was quick and easy! 


Until next time -happy crafting with ScraPerfect~



Friday, May 26, 2017

Hello Lovely: House-Mouse and Friends

Today's card was a fun one to make and I will be entering it @ House-Mouse and Friends for their "Embossing Challenge", @ Deep Ocean Challenge Blog for their "Your Furry/Feathered Friends" challenge and @ Words 2 Craft By for their Spring = Party Time challenge.


Once again, I broke out my well-loved Old World mat stack, along with a top folding A2 white card base. I currently only own 4 House-Mouse stamps, but I just adore them! The Doily Blooms stamp set is from FSJ, but was on the Retired stamp list that came out last week and is sadly now Sold Out. 


I chose to do heat embossing for the challenge and stamped my images around the edges of the card in Versamark ink. I repeated each image 2 times, but only stamped and embossed (in white powder) one design at a time so that I could see my placement on the patterned paper better. I also used ScraPerfect's Perfect Crafting Pouch to prep my paper before embossing and the Perfect Cleaning Cloth when I was all done.


Then to give the paper more of an ombre look and to help those gorgeous lacey images pop against the light blue, I blended Faded Jeans Distress Ink all along the edges. The mouse image was stamped with Momento Tuxedo Black ink and carefully colored with Spectrum Noir pens and fussy cut out.


I popped the focal image up with mini foam dots to give it dimension and adhered the panel to my card front with my ATG gun.


To finish the card front off, I used a corner rounder punch on the four bottom corners. I am really in love with the way this card turned out...now I just have to decide who I want to give it to.


For the inside of the card, I used the scrap of patterned paper left over from the card front on the bottom and used my mini blending tool again to color the white doily a soft blue. The retired TAC "hello" I stamped in FSJ Licorice Black ink and the "lovely" is die cut from metallic gray cardstock and adhered with my ScraPerfect Best Glue Ever.


Until next time~




Tuesday, May 23, 2017

Old Truck for Father's Day

Today's card was made for my Dad for Father's Day (shhh, Mom -don't tell! LOL) and inspired by sketch #64 @ Your Next Stamp. I'll be entering it for the "Mighty Men of May" challenge @ Open-minded Crafting Fun Challenges, for  "Always Anything Goes @ Pammie's Inky Pinkies ChallengesCrafting From The Heart, and Always Fun Challenges.




Like the deer stamp in my last post, this is a pretty large stamp, so I decided to make this into an A7 (5x7) size card from a side folding white card stock base. Using a retired old truck stamp from TAC, I repeat stamped it 2-3 times using Momento Rich Cocoa ink and my Stamp Perfect tool so that the ink was dark and crisp. The patterned paper was trimmed according to the sketch with the extra piece saved for using inside the card.


I used my ATG gun to adhere the paper layers and then punched a tiny 1/8" circle on the back inside of the card using an older CTMH punch (see placement in the photo of the inside of the card below) to thread the jute twine through...wrapping it around 3-4 times and tying it into a small bow.


I then did all the coloring with my Prismacolor watercolor pencils and a Dove Blender pen.


Using my mini ink blender tool and Ground Espresso Distress Ink, I antiqued the edges of my colored panel to give it a soft, vintage look. Foam pop dots were then added to the back to give it some dimension and adhere it to the card front.



On the inside I just used some of the leftover patterned paper from the card front and stamped the sentiments (from TAC and SU!) in the same cocoa ink. 


Until next time~


Friday, May 19, 2017

Peaceful Deer for Father's Day

Today's card was made for my Father-In-Law using sketch #497 @ Mojo Monday and will be entered @ Watercooler Wednesday for "Judy's Masculine: Anything Goes", @ Ooh-la-la Creations for "Something beginning with B" and @ My Creative Scoop for "Color Inspiration Monday #22".






















Unfortunately, my memory is not serving me well in remembering where I got this deer stamp -maybe because it was over 10 years ago, lol. I don't use it often because of it's large size but when I decided to make 5 x 7 (A7) size cards for Father's Day this year, I knew it would be just perfect! The card base was made from side folded kraft cardstock and all the stamping was done in Rich Cocoa Memento ink.


I trimmed the striped patterned paper to fit according to the sketch and ran a piece of vellum thru my Amaze Machine using the forest trees embossing folder from We R Memory Keeper's for some subtle backgound texture. After adhering those layers to the card front using my ATG gun, I splattered the whole front with my FSJ Silver Silk.


I love, love, love using my Stamp Perfect tool to get a nice dark, crisp image with repeat stamping and I inked the Buck up at least 2 times to really get the image to pop off the kraft cardstock. Using google to photo reference, I then colored the white parts with a chalk pencil and for the rest of the image I used Prismacolor pencils. 


I then used a Prismacolor Blending Marker on the main body of the deer to enhance and smooth out the color, but I still love the way the texture of the kraft shows through a bit!


I mounted the deer portrait to the card front using foam pop dots.


Using the scraps of patterned paper to accent the inside, I kept it sweet and simple with 2 retired sentiments from TAC and a row of pine trees.


This card is now all ready for my hubby to sign and give to his dad in a few weeks! Until next time~


Wednesday, May 17, 2017

Beautiful Bridal Bouquet

Today's card was created for one of my soon to be "niece-in-laws" who is marrying one of my nephews this coming August...I was unable to attend her bridal shower over the weekend, but I made sure to send along her gift and a hand made card with my daughter who was attending. I will be entering this card for the "Girly" challenge @ Dare2BArtsy, the "Feminine" challenge @ Great Impressions and the "Flowers" challenge @ Retro Rubber.







The stamp set I used today is retired from Close To My Heart and is at least 5 years old, but I have lost track of what year I actually bought it in. I used a side-folding A2 white cardstock base and Whisper White cardstock from Close to My Heart for the watercolored pieces. I began by adhering the 3 small roses on one block and randomly stamping them in Versamark ink (to fill the panel) and create my own pattern paper -then heat embossed the images in white embossing powder. I made sure to use my Perfect Crafting Pouch first to eliminate any static and when I was done embossing, I brushed off any residual powder with the Perfect Cleaning Cloth


When it came time to do the watercoloring, I was wishing I had an artist's palette to work out of, but I made do using the lid instead. I like using a waterbrush because right now I don't have a large selection of  actual watercolor brushes and this way I could control the water output better. I used 3 shades of pink, green, blue and a purple to color the background images and the large bouquet. (The watercolors are nothing fancy -just a set I picked up at Michael's a few weeks ago)


To assemble my card, I first ran a piece of wide gold glitter washi tape down the card spine and then slightly overlapped the watercolored rose background panel. I die cut the word "love" from both pink glitter paper and fun foam so that I could layer it to get some dimension...the No Clog Writing Cap I have on my Best Glue Ever really comes in handy to do fine detail gluing like this! 


I fussy cut the bouquet and adhered it with thick foam dots to the watercolor panel after adding a swirl of fine gold metallic thread behind it. The pearls had an adhesive backing on them already, so I just spread them around the card front until I got the look I wanted...using both the small and medium sizes.


I heard through the grape-vine that the Bride-To-Be was very pleased with her card -she too is a paper crafter and I knew she would appreciate the effort that went into it's creation!


On the inside, I just left the sentiment speak for itself...keeping it clean and simple.


Until next time~